by Kim
Disclaimer: They’re not mine even if I wish they were…don’t sue me, I have no money anyway.
Rating: PG-13
Archive: Dani-bani-bobani-banana-fanna...okay I'm stopping. Ummm, let's see Dani, Becc, Nat, Koren...oh frell. There's far too many of you people's. If you want it (which I seriously doubt you will) go for it. Just drop me a line telling me where it is.
Spoilers: “PK Tech Girl,” and minor spoilers for a few others.
Summary: John and Aeryn have to wait in a cave for a storm to blow over…’nuff said.
Notes: It’s not my fault…they made me do it (looking accusingly at Becc and Nat). Set before “Through the Looking Glass.” Thanks to James my wonderful beta (if there are any mistakes, they're probably mine because I have this nasty habit of adding whole scenes after they've been proofread). Oh and this is very, very shippy. You have been forewarned…
Editor's note: I have kept this in the parts I received it in.
*****
Crichton was being impossible! Not that that was unusual, but it was beginning to get on Aeryn’s very last nerves. Just because he was not from this area was not an excuse to be an idiot! Aeryn was standing in the control room with John. She was trying to teach him how to use a particular station and was getting very irritated with him. He was a smart person, he should have been picking this up faster. And did he really have to look so adorable, even if he was wearing that ugly IASA jacket and black pants? Aeryn got even more agitated as Crichton continued to look uncomprehendingly at the readouts on the screen in front of him.
“So if I push this, what would happen?” John asked as he reached his hand over to push the button.
“John, no!” Aeryn said as she smacked his hand away. “Crichton, someday you are going to kill us all.”
“Jeez, sorry. You don’t have to have a heart attack on me!”
“I was not having a heart attack.”
“It’s a human expression, you know, like if someone is getting all worked up over nothing…”
“No, I don’t know,” she said pointedly.
“Well, it’s like…you know what, never mind.”
Aeryn gave him one of her patented glares, but said nothing. She shrugged it off and tried to get back to work. A microt later, D’Argo walked in with Zhaan right behind him. Rygel and Chiana were nowhere to be found. Aeryn was worried about what those two might get into if they were left alone together. Neither of them was known for their truthfulness. Maybe she should go check on them, just to be sure. Her thoughts were interrupted by Pilot announcing that they were approaching a planet. The planet appeared in front of them on the viewscreen. It had large landmasses with aquamarine water covering most of the surface.
“Wow. That is a gorgeous planet,” John said. “The oceans should be bluer, though.”
Zhaan smiled softly at him. “I was just thinking they needed to be more purple.”
“Well, just goes to show you, there’s no place like home,” John said. A slightly odd expression came to his face after saying that.
“What is it, Crichton?” Aeryn asked. She had been watching him out of the corner of her eye and noticed the change in his expression.
“Oh, nothing. I just had a weird Wizard of Oz flashback,” John said shaking his head.
Aeryn looked at John quizzically. “Wizard of Oz,” she repeated. “Who is that?”
“Oh, just a wizard. He rules over some little people,” John said with a smile.
“Crichton, what are you talking about?” Aeryn asked exasperated. His human references and comments could be so confusing sometimes.
“Never mind Aeryn,” John said. “Hey Pilot, is this planet inhabited?”
Pilot’s purple face appeared in front of them. “My scanners indicate no advanced life forms are present.”
“Well, if there are no life forms present, then why are we wasting our time here?” D’Argo asked impatiently.
“While there are no higher life forms,” Pilot said. “My scanners do indicate much vegetation.”
“So? What’s your point?” D’Argo asked.
“We are almost out of food,” Aeryn offered defending Pilot.
“Yeah, we could go down there and take a look to see if there’s anything we want,” John said.
While they had been discussing it, Rygel hovered in eating a food cube. “What?! You think you are going to go down to that planet and food will just magically appear? I would expect this from humans, given the example we have here, but from a Peacekeeper? Are you out of your frelling minds? I will not allow it. We should be on our way. We have a contact on Peridiam III who will not wait for us long.
“But, your eminence,” Zhaan said. “We are in desperate need of supplies. Ever since Chiana came on board, we have been exhausting our already small supply even more. Peridiam III is two weeks away from here, we will surely need food before then.”
“I say we just throw Chiana out of an airlock then,” said Rygel. “We are just wasting precious resources on her anyway.”
“Alright, that’s enough Rygel,” John said irritably. “Aeryn, D’Argo, and I will go down to the planet and check it out. We’ll be back in plenty of time to make our contact.”
*****
Down on the planet, it was mid-morning. The sun was shining brightly, but it was not hot. A slight breeze rustles the tops of the trees. It was a forested region. Cool and damp, but not uncomfortably so. The transport pod had landed in the middle of a large clearing in the forest, next to a stream. John stepped out and stretched happily.
“This reminds me of camping with my dad back on Earth,” John said.
Aeryn and D’Argo made no comment as they carried out three handheld scanners, their weapons, and some sacks for food. With little more than a cursory glance at their surroundings, Aeryn walked over to hand John a scanner and a sack.
“This will scan to see if there is any edible food,” she stated. “Don’t break it.”
“Hey that Peacekeeper pulse rifle was a total fluke,” he said defensively. “I don’t do that with everything you know.”
Aeryn ignored him as she and D’Argo discussed how best to search the surrounding area. “We should split up in order to cover the most ground,” D'Argo said.
“Yes, that’s a good idea. You go west and I’ll go east.”
“What about Crichton?” D’Argo asked.
“Crichton, would you get back here!” yelled Aeryn.
While they had been speaking, John had managed to wander off into the surrounding forest. He was, at the moment, crouched down staring in fascination at a lizard-like creature catch food in the stream. He had never seen anything like this animal. It was enthralling. Ignoring Aeryn’s call he said, “Hey, you guys, look at this! It’s like part lizard, part raccoon, part bird all rolled into one!”
“John, we’re supposed to be looking for food,” Aeryn said.
“He won’t be much help to us,” said D’Argo. “Why don’t you just take him along.”
“Why do I have to take him?! Why don’t you?”
D’Argo said nothing, he just gave her a look that told her she knew exactly why and that he wasn’t in the mood to argue. Aeryn looked down slightly, then straightened.
“Try not to let him wander off.” D’Argo said. “You know how he gets into trouble.”
Aeryn simply nodded and went off to collect Crichton from where he was still staring at the creature in fascination.
“Come on John, we have work to do,” she said.
“Oh, but Aeryn look at this guy! He’s…” he was cut off when Aeryn unceremoniously grabbed his collar and yanked him up.
“We don’t have time for this,” she reminded him. “Come on.”
“Alright, alright. I’m coming, jeez. You Peacekeepers really aren’t big on manners are you?”
Aeryn shot him another glare that immediately shut him up, but didn’t reply. They walked along in silence for a while, Aeryn scanning for food and collecting some while John simply enjoyed the peace and quiet. Being behind Aeryn had given him the perfect opportunity to observe her without being seen. She was wearing her usual dark colored pants and one of her tank tops and vest. She had her hair tied back, Crichton noticed disappointedly. He liked her hair. He tripped over a rock after that thought. He hadn’t noticed it before, but the terrain had begun to change. The trees became taller and it was quickly getting steeper and rockier. John found himself getting out of breath very quickly whereas Aeryn seemed perfectly fine. He stopped to rest under a tree for a minute, and the next thing he knew, Aeryn was nowhere to be found. He called her name, but she didn’t answer. He finally thought of his communicator and tried calling her or D’Argo through that, but it was no use.
“The mountains must be interfering with communication,” he said to himself. “Oh, well. Aeryn should notice I’m not with her soon. She’ll come back for me.”
He then sat down on a rock contentedly looking around, waiting for Aeryn. It wasn’t all that often that there was this much peace and quiet. The ship tended to be a madhouse most of the time, and he found himself yearning for home where he used to take long walks in the mornings. He found himself missing a lot of the little things, since he had been out here. Those were the ones that counted the most, he had decided.
*****
Aeryn hadn’t noticed when John had disappeared, she just suddenly realized he was not with her anymore. She called out his name and all she got was the rustle of the wind through the trees as her answer. The wind had been picking up steadily as she went higher on the mountain and she suddenly found herself very thankful that she had tied her hair back today. She tried her communicator and found that it wasn’t working. Since she was near the top of the mountain anyway, she decided to go all the way up and see if communication was better up there. She climbed higher until she reached the peak. Immediately she tried calling John. He didn’t respond so she tried D’Argo.
“D’Argo, can you hear me?”
“Yes, Aeryn, what is it?”
“Well, I found a few food sources, but they are not very good. John wandered off and now I can’t find him. He’s not answering over his communicator.”
She heard him softly cursing and smiled slightly. “This is a rather mountainous region we’re in. I think that’s what’s disrupting communication.”
“All right, give me your location and I will come help you look.”
After she did so she asked, “Did you find anything?”
“No, not really. There is a small supply of some sort of vegetable I noticed. I will ask Zhaan to come down and collect it while I help you look for Crichton.”
“All right. I’m going to go look for John now. Communication will probably be impossible once I get lower into the mountains.”
“Understood,” he grunted.
*****
Go on